


Bee Culture for Detectives

by sanguinity



Series: Monographs [2]
Category: Elementary (TV), Practical Handbook of Bee Culture - Sherlock Holmes, Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: 221B Ficlet, Bees, Gen, RPF, invisible library
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-04
Updated: 2014-03-04
Packaged: 2018-01-14 14:26:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1269808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanguinity/pseuds/sanguinity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three <i>Practical Handbooks of Bee Culture</i>, their authors, and their other publications about beekeeping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Beekeeping in the Work of a Criminal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Violsva](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Violsva/gifts).



> You never specified which _Practical Handbook_ , so have a trio of Holmeses and their other works on beekeeping. Sadly, these are only excerpts: I hope you will forgive me that I have written invisible fic of their original invisible monographs.
> 
> Much thanks to my betas, Grrlpup and Language_Escapes.

Those who conscientiously apply themselves to the science of detection know that one cannot overstate the importance of a thorough command of criminal history: felons are rarely so original as to devise entirely new ruses for their nefarious goals. However, it sometimes happens that technological advances may cause heretofore obscure methods — methods nevertheless as old as antiquity — to become newly practicable. In such instances, a seemingly new method of crime, apparently without antecedent, may spring up among the criminal classes.

Notwithstanding the popularity of _miel fou_ on the Continent, not since the unhappy army of Pompey have we seen a poisoner deliberately introduce 'maddening' honeys to his victims. In recent decades, however, the Langstroth hive has prompted a renaissance in bee culture, and as noted by Mr. Kebler of the American Pharmaceutical Association, that vitalization has caused a corresponding surge in accidental poisonings from the consumption of mellitoxins. Given such developments, it was perhaps inevitable that a modern beekeeper would undertake to deliberately craft such honeys for ill purposes. Much to the distress of the inhabitants of Sussex, this past year has seen Mr. Brimley Mason, formerly of South Africa, cultivate a garden of _Atropa_ and _Euphorbia_ , which, when combined, produce a sweet, light, and dazing honey. The unfortunate recipients of this confection were thus made vulnerable to Mason's serial burglaries...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kebler, Lyman F., "[Poisonous Honey](http://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/002025285)," place of publication not identified, 189-?. ([full text](http://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015067216872); [pdf](http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/imgsrv/download?id=mdp.39015067216872;orient=0;size=100))
> 
> The term _mellitoxin_ was originated by T. Palmer-Jones, et al., in their 1947 paper, "A recent outbreak of honey poisoning," in the _New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology._ I ask the forgiveness of those authors for implicitly having Holmes coin the term several decades early.


	2. Beekeeping in the Work of a Detective

It is not uncommon for a detective to encounter the scenario wherein the existence of a crime is known, but its location, or that of the criminal, is not. While London's CCTV network can be invaluable for confirming a person's presence at a particular location, CCTV has little utility in locating a person, especially in instances where face-recognition algorithms cannot be used. The question then is how one might best employ existing physical evidence to localize a person of interest. 

In another era, London's distinctive pattern of fill material might be compared with traces of mud or dirt to localize a person within the city. Unfortunately, the uniformity of contemporary paving materials limits the practicality of this approach, and other sources of urban heterogeneity must be exploited. The variety of London's public and private gardens is suggestive, but how to build a vegetation map of sufficient completeness and accuracy? 

Fortunately for the detective, the most common vegetative physical evidence, pollen, is comprehensively sampled by London's bees. This irregular source of data can be made available to the detective through the deployment of pollen traps, devices already in the possession of many urban beekeepers. In the recent kidnapping case of Amanda Forsythe, an appeal to beekeepers' civic feeling made it possible to triangulate upon the location of a characteristic combination of blooms...


	3. Detection in the Work of Beekeeping

The history of beekeeping is as long and storied as the history of crime and its detection, but their intersection is scant. Detective Anthony Planakis is well-known to readers of this journal as the head of bee control for the New York City Police Department, and in his two decades there he has thwarted many human crimes against bees. I, in my fifteen years as an investigative consultant for the NYPD and New Scotland Yard, have twice had the good fortune to investigate human crimes committed _with_ bees. ("The Adventure of the Melliferous Madam," Summer 2004; "The Ingenious Case of the Bee Assassins," Fall 2013.) But never in our prior experience as beekeepers and detectives have we either encountered a case of crime masterminded _by_ bees. 

The savvy reader no doubt expects an account of commonplace hive-robbing dressed in the gaudy language of detective noir: writers from Aristotle to Langstroth have entertained themselves by describing thieving bees as rogues and pickpockets, making much of their sneaking manner and seedy dress. However, this was no mundane case of marauding, but as abstruse and unusual a problem as Detective Planakis and I have encountered in our careers. 

The case began after a summer storm, with the world newly washed and fresh. Detective Planakis and I strolled out to view his apiary before breakfast...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Detective Anthony "Tony Bees" Planakis is in fact in charge of bee control for the NYPD; [DNAInfo New York](http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/people/anthony-planakis) has a series of articles about his work. I hope that he would be amused by — or at least indulgent of — his inclusion here.


End file.
